


in the echoes (of what we haven't yet become)

by TiniBopper



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Never Met, Aziraphale Loves Crowley (Good Omens), Body Worship, Demon Crowley (Good Omens), Developing Relationship, Found Family, Grief/Mourning, Heavy Angst, Human Aziraphale (Good Omens), M/M, Major Original Character(s), Massage, Massage Parlor AU, Minor Original Character(s), Narrator God (Good Omens), Porn with Feelings, This Is Not Going To Go The Way You Think, Tissue Warning, heed the tags, porn is skippable, stopping the apocalypse, touch starvation is a riot
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-17
Updated: 2020-07-13
Packaged: 2021-03-03 04:29:02
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 4
Words: 12,196
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24228865
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TiniBopper/pseuds/TiniBopper
Summary: This is not the first time that he’s stood beneath a tree and contemplated making a very, very bad decision. He knows that it probably won’t be the last. He knows that he’s very, very capable of making thewrongdecision,andthat he’s done so before.He also knows that he has cometoo farand workedtoo hardto falter now.
Relationships: Aziraphale & Adam Young (Good Omens), Aziraphale & Crowley & Adam Young (Good Omens), Aziraphale & God (Good Omens), Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens), Crowley & Adam Young (Good Omens), Crowley & Warlock Dowling, Crowley (Good Omens) & Original Male Character(s)
Comments: 9
Kudos: 22





	1. another morning

####  _ (a feather on the wind) _

* * *

In movies, there are a great deal of cinematic opportunities to bring the viewers in upon the scene of focus. One could start with a line of dialogue, or a simple action done by someone near a person of interest, or a panning shot of the overall scenery closing in upon the particular location where the story will begin. 

> (In this case, let’s be cinematic, shall we?
> 
> Today is **23 February 2008.**
> 
> There are six months, still, until the day that a particular basket with a baby is delivered into the hands of a chattering nun, and eleven years past that until the slated End of the World. These events, and their scheduled placement in time, have not yet been decided upon by those who would enact it.)

The air is foggy and chilled in the pre-morning dawn, the darkness growing a bit darker before sunrise. High above central London, a crow coasts on a rare thermal and a loose feather shakes itself loose in the wind, swirling on swift eddies of moving air and pulled downward by gravity. The deep blue-black feather flutters down into streets that are already crowded with cars. Things are beginning to quiet down slowly as the feather is brushed along by traffic, and Soho _breathes_ , exhaling as the low pulsing heartbeat of nightlife settles in for sleep, and inhaling as the drowsy daytime crowd drag themselves up into functionality.

Somehow, the feather never truly touches the ground as it’s swept along on low breezes, dancing through the early morning fog until it finally comes to rest at the base of a glass door on an open and airy corner in central Soho, within easy walking distance of St. James’ Park. 

> ( _Oh, yes,_ you say, _we know where we are._
> 
> But do you? Do you think, perhaps, that this building is a bookshop?)

The building in front of which the feather lands is older than most of the other buildings in that square, with a ground and a first storey done up in faded maroon brick and wood. Though it dates back beyond most of the rest, the building looks almost brand new. A year or so ago it had been empty and outdated, with dreadful amounts of renovations needing to be done to drag it forward into the modern age -- a great portion of the first storey flooring had caved in on the ground floor, and no buyers for a good several years had been willing to pay for both the exorbitant price of locale in Soho on a prime corner building _and_ the staggering costs of fixing it up.

And yet, on a day in early 2007, the faded old "For Sale" sign in one of the cracked windows finally disappeared. The doors were left open to air out the place, day after day, and curious passers-by in the central Soho area had gotten the chance to peer inside to see a single man tirelessly clearing away broken glass, splintered wood, and scattered rubble. Trash bags filled the dumpsters outside the building day after day. The cracked windows were replaced, and the first storey was rebuilt with a central pillar ensuring it would not collapse again (a process which took very nearly a month).

Once the structural damage was attended to, the building had seemed to revitalize itself. Soho residents hadn’t seen much change over the first week or so, while the new owner fixed up the first storey into a proper flat, but after that it seemed as though from one day to the next, the brick-and-wood facing of it was scrubbed and polished clean, and the interior refreshed.

The central pillar for structural support became a moulded centerpiece of the ground storey, the spreading branches and leaves of a tree carefully shaped into the ceiling in the front entrance room. A desk was assembled to the side of the door, just under some of the windows where the light fell in, and a battered old antique cash register found a home there. Chairs and scattered tables and bookshelves were placed around the central tree and along the newly repainted walls into an unmistakable lobby area, while a small section of the larger back room was quartered off with another doorway, presumably for an office space. No one really had the chance to see what was happening within the larger back room, but the revitalization of the old building had snagged the fleeting glances of those who walked past it from day to day.

Soho residents had finally watched, quietly intrigued, around about August of 2007 as the building’s new owner had finally stood on a ladder on the street and carefully painted a name for the establishment along the top edge of the front doorway in gold filigree, with elegant, looping script. That same name was then etched in a similar style onto the glass of one of the central front windows, curved around a space into which the delicately painted branches of a tree design was sketched. The owner’s hands had been stained gold by the work, before he was finally done, and after he wrote out the expected store hours he had finished by hanging a "Opening Soon" sign on the front door.

Soho, in response, had held its breath, and kept a quiet eye open for the day that the shop finally opened its doors.

> (But, we digress. That was then, and this is now. In another lifetime, this building was a bookshop, but today, the shop that it’s become has been open for nearly half a year, and has grown its roots into Soho as though it always belonged there. Let’s return to 23 February 2008, shall we?)

The glass windows are fogged over outside with early morning dew in the chill air, but the "Closed" sign on the door is swiftly flipped to "Open" at 7 AM on the dot, just as the sun crests the horizon for the day. The locks on the front door are undone, the blinds inside the windows pulled up to send soft golden-gray just-dawn light into the open room beyond the doors. A kettle whistles softly into the air inside and is just as swiftly pulled off of the heat before it can become a shrill screech breaking the peace of the early morning.

A pair of calloused, but well-kept hands flips open a ledger book on the desk set to the side of the entry room, and a finger trails down along the names and time-stamps written in under the date at the top. There are five names on the list, today, and that means it promises to be a busy morning within a few minutes time.

The hands flip the ledger book shut, and then busy themselves with making a morning mug of tea from the kettle.

> (Oh, but you’re growing impatient by now, aren’t you? You presume you know who this is, after all. But, patience. The promised cinematic cold open is very nearly done.)

As the first bustle of Soho’s morning life breathes itself awake, the crow feather slips through the crack at the bottom of the door of the East of Eden massage parlor. It comes to rest at a pair of scuffed old leather shoes, and is picked up by those calloused, manicured hands.

A small, quiet smile forms on his lips as he traces the edge of the feather with his fingertips. He tucks it into the breast pocket of his waistcoat to save for later. 

Even without considering possible meanings for why this particular feather landed at his feet, Dr. Ezra Fell has a very understated fondness for crow feathers, after all.


	2. another lifetime

####  _ (we haven’t met yet, have we?) _

* * *

23 February 2008   
12:06 PM

A massage parlour, the demon known as Anthony J. Crowley thinks, ought to be an easy target for a Temptation.

And he  _ needs _ something easy, right now; he knows that the shit list in Hell is getting shorter and shorter by the day and he needs to get  _ off _ of it, quickly, before it ends up being his name up next under Lord Beelzebub’s scrutiny,  _ his _ sorry ass having to explain how, as a matter of fact, he has a wonderful idea for how to spread wrath among thousands if not millions of Londoners currently in the works, actually.

> (To be absolutely fair to the demon Crowley, he  _ does  _ have a plan in the works that would theoretically do just that, he was just working out some of the kinks for how to... enact it. It will take a few more months of research and beguiling to get his way in to actually pull it off, is all.
> 
> Astute readers will likely know that he will succeed at this ploy in about six months from the current day, when he takes down all of the London-wide mobile networks, a few hours before being summoned for a delivery. 
> 
> He does not get off of Hell’s Shit List in time.)

So he needs an easy temptation; what’s easier than inciting a little Lust in a place where bodies are  _ expected _ to be bare? He’s no stranger to tempting people into Lust, after all, and he knows that he’s exceptionally good at it in the looks department. The choice of the parlour is partially to do with how near it is to his own Mayfair flat, and partially (okay, at least a moderate amount) due to the  _ name _ of the place.

> ("East of Eden" is a bit eye-catching when one has literally been to Eden. Not to mention that in the modern-day, biblical allusions usually indicated that the owner was a religious person, and those were always bigger points down Below.)

He’d read the online reviews of the place to get a good idea what he would be getting into, and what they said was illuminating about more than just the establishment. Apparently, it was run and solely staffed by the owner, Dr. Ezra Fell, a man who had bought the building and renovated it on his own, who lived in the flat that took up the first storey of the building. Several reviews cited the service as ‘heavenly’. The fact that the parlor is appointment-only in the mornings and open to walk-ins in the afternoons (under the assumption that it was first come first serve) is also a helpful nugget of information.

One particularly lengthy and glowing review went on about Dr. Fell’s personality as it related to the service, about how warm and welcoming he was, and extremely easy to talk to, versed on enough different subjects that, while the reviewer had been going to regularly get massages since the shop opened half a year before, they’d never had a doubled conversation. The review went on to cite that refreshments were seemingly always available, and the shop itself was clean and, while Dr. Fell was clearly devout and knowledgeable in Christian biblical study, the effects of his faith were tasteful in the decorations of the shop. Even as an atheist, it hadn’t come across as overbearing, and there had been at least one very in depth conversation about faith that had gone uncharacteristically pleasantly. Overall, a five star review.

_ This, _ Crowley thinks as he changes into his tightest fitting jeans and his most form-accentuating black T-shirt,  _ ought to work.  _ He makes sure his sunglasses are snugly in place, ties back his shoulder length tangle of curly hair, and twirls his keys around one finger as he strolls down the stairwell from his flat in order to seduce a masseuse. 

* * *

There’s just something about the intersection that Ezra has a weakness for. It isn’t too different from the rest of Soho, or even too different from the rest of central London, but this particular intersection had still seemed to snag his heart right out of his chest when he saw it for the first time. The buildings on each corner are older facades, brick and mortar with slightly warped glass windows, and the intersection itself is large enough to escape the otherwise-winding one way streets in the surrounding area. The resulting open area of the street lets the sunlight cascade in between the buildings, seeming to warm the air itself, and the clean openness of St. James park is a brisk ten minute walk away if one absolutely needed to get away from the crowded clamor of Soho.

He props open and stands by the front door to his shop, tea in hand, and looks out over the intersection as it slowly comes alive with the morning sunlight. The florist across the way notices him and waves as she pulls her own windows open, the floral scent spilling out into the intersection, and he smiles slightly and raises a hand to wave back. She’d been the first to donate to the shop; the battered old kettle had been hers, once upon a time. He’d set up a line of counters and cabinets along one wall of the lobby just to have a place to put it, and to stock up on supplies for it. It had been set up beside a newer coffee maker, which he didn’t personally use much, but he knew several of his customers appreciated the variety.

> (In this way, Soho had managed to seep itself into the parlour -- inch by inch, with gifts and breaths and the souls who gave the city a heartbeat in the first place. An old tea kettle, donated children's toys in a corner set aside for little ones to play while their parents had their appointments. 
> 
> One young wisp of a child had come in and offered to paint a mural on one wall if he would sign off on community service hours for their high school classes, had spent a week of afternoons and a weekend of day long visits quietly paint-stained and diligent while Dr. Fell worked and supervised. 
> 
> They'd added paint smears to the moulded tree centerpiece, too, making it look brighter, more  _ real _ , as though a real apple tree was growing through the center of his shop. He'd kept them plied with beverages and food while they worked, and silently watched a tiny marvel unfurl across the once-pale green wall. Customers had been likewise eager and delighted.)

A smattering of greetings come from the passersby, soft and sleepy "morning"s and one or two good and proper "good morning Dr. Fell"s. He returns them in kind with a smile for each, small circular glasses hanging low on his nose as he people-watches.

He spots his first appointment of the day while she’s still down the street-- Mrs. Marsden, a lovely older lady who tended to have trouble with her lower back, who had also recently torn a shoulder muscle and was in recovery, had booked a 7:15 AM appointment for a 30 minute massage. She was fairly consistent, and he saw her at least once a month. The crowded sidewalk seems to part in respect for her as she comes closer, and he takes another sip of his tea before she reaches him.

"Good morning." he greets her as she comes up to the door, looking a bit breathless and a bit rumpled. Her eyes are still hazy with sleep, but the laugh lines around them are crinkled fondly already when she meets his gaze.

"Do you  _ ever _ sleep?" she teases, shaking her head behind a yawn. "Your flat light is left on well into the night, and you’re always up at the crack of dawn, and always so put together, doctor. You stay up so late, and must get up so early, yet you never seem tired!" 

"I certainly find myself to be a morning person." he waves her inside with a smile, walking with her over to the counter with various mugs and the kettle set up on it. "Would you like a cuppa before we begin, madam?"

Her appointment goes quickly, with a soft sort of teasing familiarity bred of several repeat visits. Ezra enjoys her company and very gently redirects her prodding, grandmotherly worry about whether or not he has a lucky "Mrs. Fell" yet. He very nearly drops something when Mrs. Emiliana Marsden, 68 years old and  _ very _ old fashioned, innocently adds on that there was no shame if it was a lucky "Mr. Fell" instead.

His second appointment is a quiet, frazzled young man who arrives at 7:50 AM, 60 minute massage booked for 8, who looks like he just rolled out of bed, with a college textbook tucked under his arm that he reads through while Ezra cleans up the back room from Mrs. Marsden’s appointment. Ezra asks him what he’s studying and is rewarded with a slightly baffled explanation of the man’s major. Computer programming is a bit of a mystery to the both of them, as it happens, but they talk quietly throughout the appointment while Ezra works a knot the size of a golf ball out of the young man’s neck, one which has been ensuring that he was faced with chronic, throbbing tension headaches. The moment that it finally dissolves under his deft, practiced hands, the young man lets out a sound almost like a sob of relief and the bowstring taut tension throughout his body leaks out like a balloon that has finally popped.

Ezra’s third and fourth appointments walk in while the man is still recovering, at 9 AM, a pair of giggly teenage girls who chatter to each other about being on a spa day out, and about their later stops that day including a mani-pedi, a facial, a trip to the hair stylists, and later that evening a night out on the town. They questioned why he couldn’t do both of them in a single appointment and he had to assure them that it was simply because he didn’t have enough hands to do so. The gentle explanation that he both owned and was the only worker of the parlor had gotten a couple of joking questions about whether he was hiring or not, and he’d had to politely turn them down.

By the time that his fifth and final appointment of the morning walks in at 10:30 for one final hour long appointment, Dr. Fell is more than ready to take his lunch break. This young man is quiet, and doesn’t respond much to gentle attempts to draw him into conversation, so Ezra takes that as a sign that perhaps this one finds it more comfortable when he’s left alone in silence. He focuses on his work and when the man is ready to leave and pay, he offers a quiet, very honest ‘thank you’ on the way out.

His lunch goes from 11:30 until noon, each day, and he stops by different little restaurants when he can fit the travel time in alongside actually eating. Today is not one of those days, today he simply ducks upstairs to make himself a sandwich from the last bits of leftover shredded chicken marsala that he’d had from a rather delicious little italian restaurant the night before. It goes well with a cup of tea from the kettle downstairs, and lets him sit at his desk while he eats, making notes at his ledger about the appointments he’d seen for the day.

Mrs. Marsden’s torn shoulder muscle was healing nicely, though she still had difficulty lifting her arms higher than her shoulders. The young man studying computer programming had set up a repeat appointment for two weeks from now. The two girls were likely not going to return, or if they were then they weren’t going to be regulars. He wasn’t sure about the last one, as no concrete plans had been made, but he’d seemed genuinely pleased with his service and certainly seemed like a nice young man.

He had finished off his sandwich and was sitting behind his desk with a book open and a cup of cocoa when the bell over the door jangled. Mornings were busy, but afternoons were usually a grab bag over whether or not he’d get walk-ins.

So it is, then, that as the clock ticks over onto 12:17 on that gloriously sunny Saturday afternoon of 23rd February, the esteemed Dr. Ezra Fell looks up from his book, and his heart stutters over its pulse.

His eyes catch first on the play of sunlight over hair just a tad too fiery red to be called 'copper', tied back in a loose knot quite low near the collar of (as he notices second) the  _ very  _ form fitting black t-shirt hugging the entering man's torso. His eyes skitter back up to the dark circular sunglasses secured snugly on the bridge of a long, narrow, slightly crooked thin nose, then to the movement of deft, thin fingers twirling a set of keys around one knuckle.

These specifics are what Ezra drinks in at first: black nail polish lacquered in an onyx sheen over perfectly shaped nails, swaying hips tucked into jeans that cling to every jutting angle of him, a sort of  _ swagger _ as he enters like he's just laid claim over the place. A jawline that could cut glass, a light tic in the cheek as he surveys the room, eyes hidden by shades darker than the night sky, but Ezra still able to know exactly where he's looking underneath them.

Somehow, he manages to keep his voice steady, as he puts down his tea cup and tucks a bookmark into his book. "Good afternoon. Welcome to East of Eden massage parlour, how may I help you?"

* * *

The reviews didn’t really go into detail about the look of the place. Crowley’s first impression was that he must have the wrong address; he casually parked the Bentley in front of the corner building that opened outward onto a busy two way street in central Soho, and the red brick-and-wood facade hadn't exactly screamed massage parlour at first glance. 

> (Honestly, if he had passed this place without paying it much mind, he would have probably mistaken it for an antique shop or maybe an old bookstore; the door is just a tiny bit cramped and small, in that way of very old buildings that were built before more standardized sizing, but the windows look like new glass, and the facing is old-fashioned but spiffy clean. He almost finds himself expecting to walk in and find a scruffy and absent looking librarian-type, at first.)

On second glance, though, Crowley saw the name written out in delicate handwritten gold filigree-- first over the door, then around the tree motif on the window.

A bell jingles when he walks in that doorway, twirling his keys around one knuckle while he scans the primary room. The  _ first _ thing his eyes land on is the tree carved into the center of the shop, branches disappearing into the ceiling, knots and swirls in the trunk highlighted with greenish-gold and coppery brown, and a moulded 'apple' hanging off of one branch was painted a warm cinnamon red.

Then his eyes land on the mural.

It spans the entirety of one wall, unbroken, with only a chair or two and a few scattered children's toys in one corner in front of it. For a moment, it's as though he's been transported back 6000 years, to a sight that had stuck with him since; greenery, trees, and foliage pockmarked by brilliant splashes of colorful fruits and flowers, a waterfall set to one side of the mural, and there in the green, tastefully nude, are Adam and Eve. Adam is sitting beneath a tree with a woven basket on his lap, filled with lumpy green pears, and Eve is laying on her stomach on a branch above him, holding another pear down for him to take. What surprises him the most, however, is that they’re the correct skin color and everything.

> (For those wondering, the tiny waif of an artist who had painted it had ever so hesitantly asked Dr. Fell if he minded if they made Adam and Eve look "like them". Ezra had been delighted that he didn't need to prompt them, and had put extra marshmallows in their cocoa that evening.)

"Good afternoon. Welcome to East of Eden massage parlour, how may I help you?"

He’s just getting his bearings back in the present day when the voice comes from his right, and he turns and lays eyes on the softest looking man he has ever seen. Dr. Fell is broad-shouldered, with a slightly pink countenance that could best be described as  _ warm.  _ His hair is salt and pepper but rather fetchingly going silver, he has a bit of a pouch to his stomach that indicates he takes  _ great joy _ in food, and his outfit choices seem to be about a century out of date, but it’s a flattering look on him. He has eyes that seem to look right beyond the shades covering Crowley's eyes and right into his soul, though the demon can't tell exactly what color they are at first look. At the moment they seem to be a stormy blue, buzzing with an energy akin to being in the eye of a hurricane, unsettlingly calm. There are soft stress lines across his forehead, but deep laugh lines around his eyes.

> (The reviews had, coincidentally, also not told him that Dr. Fell was, if not conventionally attractive, still a delightfully  _ handsome  _ man. Crowley thinks that this is rather a lucky bonus. And if he feels a brief spark of maybe-disappointment that Dr. Fell does  _ not _ come across as a slightly scruffy, absent minded bookseller, then it’s not strong enough for him to really quantify with words.)

Dr. Fell has his hand resting over the top of a closed book, and Crowley notes a bit distractedly that his nails are impeccably manicured. There’s a delicate gold band wrapped around his left pinky finger, catching the midday light through the window. Crowley thinks about the scads of reviews that had all cited the good doctor’s hands as their primary delight and feels his mouth twitch, biting down on the urge to smirk.

" _ You _ must be the man with the heavenly hands," he drawls, hooking his thumbs into the belt loops on his skinny jeans and swaying his way toward the counter while giving his hips free reign over his movements. He doesn’t miss the way that those stormy blue eyes flicker, going from their intense study of him to almost  _ fond _ and amused.

"Is that what people are saying now?" Dr. Fell asks, folding said hands on the desk in front of him. Crowley can’t help but trace the faint lines over the paler man’s knuckles with his eyes, watching Dr. Fell follow suit with the pads of his thumbs as though he could feel the physical touch of Crowley’s gaze, despite the sunglasses. "I do keep meaning to check the online reviews of this shop," he continues, without missing a beat, "but somehow seem to never have the time or the patience to fight with my old desktop to do so."

"They’re  _ very _ flattering, I can tell you that much. Name’s Crowley." Crowley lets a faint smile form on his face. "You do walk-ins? In the afternoons? I mean, according to the info I read up on."

"Yes," Dr. Fell nods, reaching over to pick up a small pamphlet from a stack of identical ones from within a drawer under the desk lip, holding it out toward him. "Here’s a list of the services I provide, if you’d like to take a look."

Crowley flips open the page and lowers his head a fraction as though scanning the options available. He already knows what he’s going to request, a scan of a similar services menu had been provided on the business information page during his research session. His eyes remain on the doctor behind the cover of his sunglasses. Oddly, the man continues staring up at him, seemingly making eye contact easily and his own eyes sparkling with wry amusement as the moment inches onward.

"Feel free to ask any clarification questions if you need." Dr. Fell says, after a few long seconds of Crowley pretending to read and in fact studying the good doctor from behind his glasses. 

"I think I got it," Crowley says back, noting the flare of amusement in Dr. Fell’s eyes, before he hands the pamphlet back, "The full-body Swedish massage sounds good. Do you have a time limit on walk-ins, or…"

"I generally limit things to an hour," Dr. Fell says, hands folded, "Though it does depend on how busy I am on any given day. I’ve had very slow days with very lucky customers once or twice."

Crowley idly lays a general use ‘not interested’ miracle around the place. 

"And how busy do you think this day is shaping up to be?" he drawls, arching one eyebrow behind his glasses. He’s not about to brag, but he’s relatively sure he’s going to be able to monopolize the man’s entire afternoon.

"Oh, I’m sure I don’t know." The doctor’s smile is soft and almost secretive. "Let’s see where things stand when the hour is up, shall we?"

* * *

> (Have you perhaps noticed, dear readers, what the demon Crowley has not?
> 
> If not, there’s no shame. The story will unfold before you nonetheless.)


	3. another introduction

####  _ (the soothing pressure of fingertips) _

* * *

The back room of the massage parlour is softly lit by several dozen candles spaced around the room, stacked in loose clumps on various shelves around the centralized, padded table that holds pride of place. There are two small mismatched chairs set near the door, and a cabinet with drawers set against one wall that Dr. Fell moves to immediately once he’s led Crowley back into the room. He opens one of the drawers and pulls out a pair of boxes that Crowley notes are nylon and latex gloves.

"Do you have an allergy to latex?" Dr. Fell asks politely. 

"Nah." he shakes his head, studying the way that the doctor moves as he tugs out a pair of gloves. He tugs off the ring on his pinky, placing it into the drawer, and pulls them snugly on over his hands, in very deliberate motions.

"Right, then." Dr. Fell smiles, returning the glove boxes to the drawer and closing it with a bump of his hip, moving back toward the door out of the room again. "I’ll give you the chance to disrobe, as far as you’re willing, and to lay on the table under the blanket. You will start out laying on your back, but you’ll be on your stomach after a bit, so..." he tapped at the side of his head. "The sunglasses  _ might _ get a bit uncomfortable."

Crowley notes that Dr. Fell hadn’t specifically, explicitly said that he  _ had _ to take off his sunglasses, but regardless after the door has closed behind the man, Crowley reaches up to trace a finger along the temples of the frames thoughtfully. It wouldn't do to draw up unnecessary suspicion, after all. 

There were three things he'd gathered immediately from just looking at the man, and those were, one: that he had a complex but very strong relationship with his own faith if the light of his soul could be quantified, two: that a proper seduction would likely have to be at least _marginally_ subtle to sneak past that and properly damn the man, and finally, three: that while there was no doubt in Crowley's mind that Dr. Ezra Fell was attracted to him, he also had  _ very  _ complicated emotions about his attraction, and those would likely muddy the water; they needed to be taken into account properly.

> (Demons can sense certain things, as we’re sure you know, dear reader, just as angels can sense certain things. Love may be outside of a demon’s purview to note, but more  _ physical  _ forms of interest pinged off like solar flares. 
> 
> The demon Crowley, for one, had noted that Dr. Fell’s eyes dilated from very nearly the moment they made eye contact, and he could scent just the slightest tinge of a feeling of almost perfectly mixed  _ delight _ and what could only be described as the physical form of the words  _ oh no _ .
> 
> So it was rather safe for him to say that Dr. Fell had had, at the very least, a  _ promising reaction. _ )

Feeling a bit odd to be doing so outside of his own flat, Crowley pulls off his sunglasses and folds them closed, placing them on one of the shelves near the table. He can pull up a glamour to make his eyes, if not perfectly normal-looking, at least be deemed  _ unremarkable _ to human perception. It’s going to be an unexpected snag in his half-plan of Operation: Seduce the Masseuse, an extra pull of focus and power he hadn’t counted on, but overall he isn’t too worried.

He strips the human way, taking the extra moment to tug his shirt loose from the waistband of his jeans and very deliberately thinking ‘loudly’, tugging on the barest loose threads of Temptation toward himself from this room and the room adjacent and envisioning it like plucking the most delicate of fibres in the outermost bits of fluffy salt-and-silver hair, a soft tug, like a whispered suggestion to turn the head.

_ Come on then,  _ he weaves it together, twisting it around itself and feeling the small insignificant little pinpoint of weakness redoubling while he’s slowly folding his shirt between his hands.  _ You’re going to be coming in here in a moment anyway. What’s the harm in taking just a teensy little peek, just the one for yourself, before it all gets neatly boxed up into work? Just another body on the table afterwards, innit? Surely you’ve got some perfectly reasonable excuse-- a pen dropped, and rolled under the door, or you’ve left something in one of the drawers… _

> (Temptation is very like wrangling a story narrative, you see. Any practiced writer is more than willing to tell you that there is no such thing as a perfectly planned story that goes exactly as one decided it would go before one started writing. The second that a writer imparts the first line, or the first moment a player in that story has an action all their own, the best laid plans are thrown aside for the whims and the rebellion of the Plot.
> 
> Some authors can work patiently through the rebellion until their target Plans shape themselves out of the ashes of what once was. And sometimes, the Story decides that it altogether does  _ not _ want to do what the author wants, no matter how devoutly the author tugs and pulls and tries to steer it back on track.
> 
> Temptation is very much like that; Crowley knows that the best laid plans and the most sweetly woven enticement may still yet fail if the target resolutely  _ refuses _ to be lured. It’s why he tends to prefer his widespread mischief-- better a guaranteed little on a widespread crowd than a focused lot on a non-assured single target.)

He’s undoing his belt and shimmying his pants down off of his hips, bundling that pinpoint of weakness tighter and tighter until he’s almost certain that it should be strong enough, that any second he’s going to hear the door creak gently open, hear a soft intake of breath, a quick and murmured apology…

And then he’s standing in his underwear for a few hesitant seconds, wondering why he feels disappointed and… vaguely ashamed.

The seconds stretch out a bit further, and he finally sighs and just sits, then lays on the table, delicately draping the cotton blanket over his lower half and resigning himself to lounging. Unsuccessful temptation, then. Well, Operation: Seduce the Masseuse can still proceed; he just has to be more willing to put in a bit of legwork for it.

> (This, the demon Crowley thinks, should not be too much of an issue. He has plenty of leg to do the legwork, after all.)

* * *

In the other room, Ezra took a moment to stand underneath the ‘tree’ in the room’s center, resting his hand against the gentle rises and falls of the texturing of the ‘bark’, with his head bowed and his heart hammering in his throat. In his second hand, he was twirling the blue-black feather between his fingertips, staring down at the way the light played across the slightly iridescent barbs. Thin and long and dark, a slightly bent rachis, missing a barb or two, but no notable damage to the calamus. The feather had gone through hardships but had come out unbroken.

> (This was, of course, as of yet discounting the concept that humans for millennia had understood on an altogether instinctual level, of mystical signs and sigils. A black feather heralded a call to spiritual action and self-exploration, and black  _ corvid _ feathers, especially, were for awakening, the uncovery of a mystery at hand, or the acknowledgement of something one was unwilling to admit.
> 
> That this one had brushed through his doorway today was almost certainly on purpose. If nothing else than for a warning of this occurrence, if he had only seen it coming sooner.)

This is not the first time that he’s stood beneath a tree and contemplated making a very, very bad decision. He knows that it probably won’t be the last. He knows that he’s very, very capable of making the  _ wrong _ decision, _and_ that he’s done so before.

He also knows that he has come  _ too far _ and worked  _ too hard _ to falter now. 

He lets out a slow breath, tucking the feather away and lifting his head, pulling back his shoulders and looking up at the round moulded apple shape attached to one of the ‘tree’s ‘branches’. He can almost feel the tiny little voice whispering the worst possible idea in the back of his head--  _ just a peek couldn’t hurt, could it? You only want to  _ **_look_ ** _ at him, that’s all… _ \-- but he holds firm.

_ You have a job to do _ , he reminds himself, glancing at the clock. Two minutes ought to have been long enough. He walks back over to the back room and carefully pulls the door open again, tugging it shut behind himself and careful not to break the quiet in the back room. He runs his hand over the front of a music player until he finds the ‘play’ button, and after a couple of seconds, the soft refrains of one of Bach’s violin concertos float into the air.

Crowley’s eyes are already closed, and the sunglasses are placed aside. Ezra spares himself exactly three seconds -- three  _ gloriously selfish _ seconds while he’s spreading warming oil onto his gloved hands -- letting his eyes follow the sharp lines and angles from the tip of Crowley’s crooked nose down along the craning length of his neck to the sharp points of his collarbones and beyond to the whipcord musculature clinging around his frail hips. His hands are folded across his stomach. He opens one eye as Ezra steps forward, and Ezra glances toward it-- but the light isn’t really working for getting a good look at it, unfortunately.

"Ah, a man of dignified style." Crowley muses, "Bach?"

"Concerto in A minor, at the moment." Ezra nods, reaching forward and gently tugging one of Crowley’s hands in between his own, starting from the tips of Crowley’s fingers and a rolling pressure between his forefinger and his thumb. Each finger is given individual attention before he moves the rolling pressure between his hands up to Crowley’s palm and wrist, digging his thumbs in with careful firmness.

Crowley’s eye stays open and focused on him, though his hand twitches a bit, and it’s obvious that the start of the massage is already having an effect, since his fingers go delightfully slack under Ezra’s attention, and he lets his hand be moved and dug into without complaint. His chest is rising and falling in a steady rhythm.

"I hope you don't mind me asking this," Crowley finally says, still studying Ezra with a kind of focus that makes the man want to squirm a little, "but why the whole 'Eden' theme? S'a bit… on the nose, don't you think?"

"How so?" Ezra asks, moving up to begin an up and down movement of digging his thumbs into the muscles of Crowley's arm.

"Well, I just mean, er… Eden was a  _ proclaim-ed paradise _ , and all. Seems a bit of a slap in the face for marketing purposes."

Ezra pauses, thumbs pressed into the soft flesh at the inner bend of Crowley's elbow with enough pressure to hurt, but it only hurts for a couple of seconds until Ezra's hands began moving again, dropping back down into that luxuriant ooey-gooey feeling.

"You know, I've not actually really worried over-much about anything quite so grand as  _ marketing _ ." Ezra replies, sounding amused and resolutely keeping his eyes tellingly trained on his work instead of letting them drift at all, even to meet Crowley’s gaze. "I don't need to worry  _ too _ much about how much I make with the parlour. All I really need to worry about for right now is amenities and food and the general items to keep business going. Anything beyond that is a lovely bonus."

"You live in central London," Crowley pointed out, his mouth curling into a small, snickering grin. "Renting a flat and this building alone must take up most of your profits…"

"Oh, no." Ezra’s eyes glimmered, and he finally glanced up to make eye contact in the low light again, as his hands worked up to Crowley’s shoulder, doing a quick pull and rotation of it and loosening up the muscles with practiced ease. "I bought this entire building outright last year, I don’t have to pay rent on it, or on housing, as I live in the flat upstairs. I do all of the maintenance and fixing things myself. It's been effort-intensive, but altogether quite a lot cheaper than the alternative. I only need to pay for electricity, water, gas, and waste disposal."

" _ Really? _ " Crowley’s eyes glimmered, both of them open and focused with a sharpness that could cut glass. "Then, why the Eden thematics, if it’s not to draw in customers? Just a way to express your faith, or…?"

"In a sense." Ezra hummed, moving around the table to begin the same process on the second arm, "I suppose you could say that new beginnings and, well, choices that change the entire shape of one’s future... have a particular… importance, for me,  _ if _ you’re being intensely analytical and in the mood for philosophizing."

"Oh, don't even get me started on  _ philosophizing _ , doctor. Dangerous topic, that. Hardly be able to stop."

"Go on then."

Crowley blinks, momentarily surprised, staring up at Ezra. Ezra is folding his hand back and forth at the wrist, stretching the tendons around the bones with a firmness that  _ almost _ manages to hide how delicate he’s actually being with Crowley’s thin, bony frame. He’s also turned his head minisculely to glance briefly back up toward Crowley, before focusing again on what he’s doing. Crowley takes that to mean that his minor glamour around his eyes is holding up fine, that the doctor isn’t even paying much attention to them.

It's not often that anyone  _ invites him _ to philosophize.

"Pardon?" he asks, to make sure he heard right.

"You have your own opinions on the whole Eden  _ thematics _ ," Ezra says, a small smile forming on his lips as he does so. "Feel free to go on about them. I’ll admit I’m interested."

"Well, er--" Crowley falters a bit again. He was here to try and seduce this man; philosophy wasn’t exactly the sexiest of conversation topics.

"Do feel free to be critical, as well. I’ve heard most interpretations." Ezra adds, pressing the pad of his thumb into the center of Crowley’s palm and rolling the bones just under the skin until they’re crackling and popping with an aeons worth of tension seeping out in the spaces between his knuckles. "How do _you_ view Eden?"

There’s another brief pause while Crowley comes to terms with the fact that he is, in fact, being asked this question. After a few seconds, he starts, haltingly and feeling unusually out of his depth.

"Well, I-- I think it’s a rather pretty lie, certainly." he manages, voice cracking on the last word and forcing him to take a breath and clear his throat before continuing. "A nice little cover for what amounted to a cage for its occupants. A tricked out cage, sure, but still a cage--"

"Why a cage, if I may ask?" Ezra asks.

Crowley’s answer is cut off by an unexpected yelp that shifts into a soft groan as Ezra’s hands move his shoulder around until it pops and an entire swath of tension leaks out from the muscle connecting his clavicle to his wing joint.

"Oh, dear," Ezra murmurs, amused and apologetic.

" _ Crap, shit, and corruption. _ " Crowley wheezes, eyes opening and staring up at the man as though he’d just performed some sort of miracle.

"That sounded like a good sort of groan," Ezra muses, "But do tell me if I start causing legitimate pain, that’s not my profession." 

"No--no, that was…" Crowley is still breathless, looking up at the man with wide eyes. He isn’t sure if he's even  _ allowed _ to say that it had, in fact, felt heavenly.

Ezra’s mouth curls into a soft, warm smile -- one which makes Crowley’s heart flutter and makes a shard of clear, visceral panic slice through his heart. No. No, this was not how a seduction went. One didn’t go and get  _ emotional _ over their targets. One didn't get fluttery and slack-jawed over a soft smile and gentle hands.

One didn't have an aching desire to be wrapped up in that softness like it was a gift to hoard. 

"You were saying?" Ezra says, and Crowley flounders for a moment before the doctor has mercy on him, "Eden as a big fancy cage?"

"Oh-- Oh, right. I-- I just mean. My point-- My  _ point _ is, erm." He clears his throat, blinking owlishly, and closes his eyes again because it's the option available to him other than demanding the chance to put his sunglasses back on. "They couldn’t exactly leave, could they? Before being cast out. Wasn’t even a thought in their heads that they  _ could _ , that there was a  _ world _ outside of Eden. Sure, they had everything they’d ever need or want in that Garden, but they couldn’t  _ leave _ it." He hummed.

"Until they were chased out of it," Ezra acknowledges, his hands finally skirting the edges of Crowley’s neck as he moves around behind the demon’s head. That delightfully rolling pressure dips into the crevice just between where his skull meets his spine and sends tingles back down through the already jellified muscles of Crowley’s arms.

"Until they were kicked out!" Crowley retorts, though his voice cracks on another soft groan as first one, then another of his vertebrae pop under the deliberate movements of Ezra’s fingers. " _ Oh _ , hell, doctor, your  _ hands _ ."

"So I’ve been told. You’re carrying an awful lot of tension, you know that?" Ezra’s voice is soft, teasing, as he digs his hands into the muscles at the base of Crowley’s skull, on either side of his spine. "I’m almost worried you won’t be able to move at all if I get all of it out."

"Y… Yeah, I…" another soft groan. Crowley is kind of getting to the ‘melt into the table’ stage of relaxation, for the first time since… well, hell, since he can’t remember when. "...I have a… bit of a stressful job…"

"Well, my job is to ease your stress." Ezra murmurs back before those glorious hands are off of him again and Crowley can’t help but let out a small, instinctive whine at the loss. "I’ll need you to roll onto your stomach, now, dear boy. I’ll lift the blanket an inch so you can roll without worrying about getting tangled or the like."

"Don’t peek." Crowley says, going for a tone of voice that suggests he wouldn’t mind at all if Ezra did. It’s ruined by the fact that he already sounds a little bit  _ wrecked _ .

"Of course." Ezra’s prompt response is that exact same sort of warm and amused that started those traitorous flutters in Crowley’s stomach, and a part of him is disappointed. Honestly, what will it take to get this doctor’s attention?

He rolls onto his hip, and then onto his stomach, with Ezra holding the blanket up off of him just enough that he indeed doesn’t get tangled. And then those hands are back on him again, rolling the blanket off of his legs and digging into the arches of his feet. It  _ almost _ hurts, but in such a wonderful way that Crowley can’t help but groan again.

"Lovely," the doctor starts softly as he digs his thumbs into Crowley’s calves one after another, slowly moving up his legs with a methodical sort of ease. He sounds as though he’s talking to himself, mildly astonished and pleased, "You’re so  _ responsive _ ...."

Crowley’s heart skitters off a beat. He lets out another faint sound, somewhere between a whine and a groan, and finds that he couldn’t move if he wanted to. It’s bewildering, that something this simple can feel this _ good. _

Ezra’s hands are on his thighs, now. They’re absurdly warm. Crowley has a brief flare of desperate thought: _ just a bit higher, surely you’re tempted, I’ve been tugging since I got here… _

They come up to knead just underneath where his thighs meet his arse, in that delightful range of intimacy that seems promising, but they don’t linger. All at once, he’s rolling the blanket back down over Crowley’s legs and Crowley feels an uneasy flare of panic. _ No, no, that can’t be **it**. Come back!  
_

"You’re doing wonderfully." The doctor says, in that too-soft-too-warm voice. Bach’s violins crescendo softly into the small, warmly shadowed room, and the praise does  _ something _ to Crowley’s heart-- makes it stutter, makes it thump so loudly in his skin-and-bones chest that he’s almost certain it had to have been heard, and Crowley thinks:  _ Oh, fuck. _

But it’s nothing compared to when those hands splay across his lower back, warm and strong and making Crowley feel even skinnier and more delicate than he already is, because the full spread of them seems to cover _so much_ more skin than he expected. They press him down to the table, move up in swipes on either side of his spine, fingers clipping over the faint ridges of his ribs, and this is really more direct physical contact than Crowley has had in… years, at least. Centuries, probably.

They reach the coiled mess of knotted musculature that rests where his wing joint is hidden, sinuous and inhuman in a way that no corporation is built to hide. This is one of the few places of their forms that the Hosts of Heaven and Hell simply haven’t found a way to accommodate in properly human forms. The wings can be hidden, tucked away from sight and touch, but the place where they connect to the body is both ephemeral and physical.

Ezra’s hands don’t even stutter over it. His thumbs dig right into the center, and Crowley’s back arches, his mouth dropping open in a silent ‘oh!’. It’s swift, just the right kind of pressure-- he feels the knots strain with something vaguely _ like _ pain for a second, and then--

Crowley has never,  _ ever _ , let out a sound that  _ sexual _ before over such a non-sexual act.

It’s _ orgasmic. _ It’s  _ bliss. _ It’s  _ heaven. _

Ezra chuckles above him, a sound that rumbles through his stocky frame, and he rolls his thumbs through the wing joint again, quickly dispersing any lingering tension.  _ He’s way too good at that, _ Crowley thinks distantly. "Very good," Ezra murmurs, the praise causing that dangerous  _ oh no oh fuck oh shit _ feeling again, but Crowley can’t bring himself to care. "That’s it, just relax, I’ve got you."

> (You might be entertained, dear readers, in knowing that the demon Crowley very briefly ends up wondering if one can be discorporated from being  _ too  _ relaxed.
> 
> He has not been fully relaxed since before the Fall. It isn’t exactly something a demon can afford to be.)

The rolling, absolutely heavenly pressure slows, and then finally stills, as the music player eventually winds to a stop. Crowley isn’t fully sure how long he lays there, afterward. Maybe it’s only a minute or two. Maybe it’s an eternity. He hears Ezra moving around the room, pulling the gloves off and tossing them, pulling the drawer where he kept the gloves open again and retrieving his ring. He hears the soft breathing and the softer flickering echo of a heartbeat. Through it all, he leaves his eyes unfocused on the floor beneath the table.

It’s not until those warm hands rest gently on his shoulder that he plucks some of his awareness back into place. "I think that’s enough for the day, my dear." Ezra’s voice breaks the silence in a murmur. "Much more and you might not be able to leave for the night. Would you like help standing?"

Crowley… manages a  _ sound _ . It’s mostly consonants.

The doctor helps him sit up, and seems utterly unperturbed by his sitting there in his underwear. Crowley realizes belatedly that his spine seems to have forgotten how to be human, and one of Ezra’s hands stays hooked under his arm to help keep him held up.

(The doctor is  _ strong _ , he notes distantly. Holding him up with one hand while he deftly nabs various articles of clothing with the other.)

He starts helping with Crowley’s shirt, and Crowley manages to move his lax muscles enough to actually wiggle it back onto his body, followed shortly by his skinny jeans, which take a bit more effort. By the time he’s slipping his feet back into the one set of actual shoes he owns, the doctor has snagged his sunglasses and is carefully -- and oh-so-tentatively -- holding them out for the demon to take again. 

He meets and holds Crowley’s eyes in the low light before he does so, and Crowley briefly forgets to breathe. He forgets if he managed to maintain the glamour or not. In the soft orange glow of the candle light, those eyes shine like liquid copper, and Crowley has no defense against it.

"I think," Ezra murmurs, handing him his sunglasses, "that I can expect you back again." his mouth curls upward into a slow, soft smile that  _ aches,  _ "For more philosophy if nothing else."

He walks Crowley out and settles him in the seating area, right as the bell over the door jingles again, and then his attention is fully on the next customer, and Crowley is left alone.

He leaves without paying. He doesn’t even know if Ezra notices. He has a lot to think about.


	4. another angel

####  _ (heaven’s expectations never cease) _

* * *

> (Do you perhaps wonder yet, dear readers, what the situation is if the one you expected to be an angel does not appear to be so? There is still a demon on Earth, after all, doing his best to influence mortals and do Hell’s work, surely there must still be an angel assigned to thwarting him?
> 
> Not to worry -- there  _ is _ an assigned angelic emissary. You may relax in knowing that some things remain the same.
> 
> However, where some things remain the same...)

* * *

26 February 2008   
1:08 PM

Crowley puts down the steaming paper cup first, before the brunet angel has a chance to notice he’s getting too-close-for-comfort. They’ve had ‘oops’es before when he comes up from behind on their blind spot, but coming up from behind them is the only way to initiate a conversation in the _first_ place. They leave if they sense him coming. So he’s gotten very good at slipping an arm over their shoulder to place bribery down before they can react.

The angelic emissary still startles a little bit, but they’ve been interacting on and off often enough that beyond that first small startle, and the glowering look they cast over their shoulder at him, Crowley escapes unscathed. It’s a good thing, too - he can’t afford to lose another corporation to this angel, if he does Hell might just not send him back topside. There have been too many occasions where the startle would have twin daggers following through, and only so many ways to explain himself.

The angel turns and looks at the steaming cup, popping the top off of it with a cursory sniff. The coffee inside is as black as Crowley could get it, and he’d paid extra for about three extra shots of espresso. Whatever the angel smells seems to pass inspection, and they tip it back in a way that would make overworked college students at midterms proud, guzzling about three-quarters of it in four long gulps.

When they stop, they put the cup down and heave a sigh that speaks _volumes_ toward their current willingness to deal with him. "Alright, snake, what do you want?"

> (This, dear readers, is the Principality  **Arteael** . They are what one might call… regularly uncompromising. They are  _ also _ the only angel who has lasted on earth for longer than a century thus far.
> 
> There have been rather a lot of angels assigned to Earth, as it happens. It would be a bit of a headache to attempt to list them all; and it was certainly more than a bit of a headache to Gabriel, who was the primary Archangel in charge of monitoring the Earth assignments. None of them are what one could call ‘suitable’ to blending in on Earth. Arteael is also not a _precise_ fit, but they are the closest thing that Heaven has, at the moment.
> 
> Arteael, as it happens, is not one of Gabriel’s usual subordinates. They report first and foremost to Uriel, and it is more than  _ a little _ telling that they answer primarily to the Archangel of Wisdom.
> 
> Wisdom, after all, comes from assimilating new information as it becomes available. Why close off an avenue of potential information for something as _petty_ as being on enemy sides?)

"I need a favor, Arte," Crowley says, bluntly. Arteael's eyes narrow slightly at the unwelcome nickname, but they don't stab him for it, and Crowley counts that as a win. If they won't use his name, he categorically refuses to use theirs.

"Thus, your bribery." They drawl back instead, tone of voice warning that their patience was already thin on the ground and he had best get to the point. "That much was  _ obvious _ ."

"More specifically, I need you  _ not _ to interfere with what I'm doing for a while." Crowley slides himself into the chair across from the Principality, and tries not to wince when narrowed acid green eyes snap up from the cup and bore into his.

"Define 'a while'." Arteael replies, voice flat. "And 'what you're doing', while you're at it."

"Just-- I dunno, a month or two? Maybe?" Crowley can't help but grimace. "First attempt went rather arse over tea kettle, I'm not sure on a specific time frame, but--"

"Are you going to  _ explain _ what I need to keep my nose out of, or am I going to have to stick it into your business just to get the information  _ in the first place _ ?" 

"I'm on Hell's Shit List." Crowley snaps back, his own patience finally fraying. Why heaven couldn't have sent an angel that was less of a chore to even be around... "They don't think I'm pulling enough and my last pet project was a flop, I need  _ numbers _ right now. Which means I'm resorting to--" he gave a theatrical shudder, "-- _ old fashioned  _ temptations. I need you to mind your own  _ fucking _ business until I have at least  _ one temptation _ accomplished so I don't get tossed in the Pit for a couple hundred years."

"So you expect me to slack off on thwarting you when I  _ know _ you're mucking about, causing trouble," Arteael replies, and Crowley feels a hiss bubbling at the back of his throat, tastes venom leaking from his fangs. He's very briefly tempted to break their armistice then and there, but swallows the urge (and the venom) down. 

"Let me put it this way: You let me corrupt  _ one _ soul that wouldn't normally be heading Downstairs," he holds out his hands as though weighing them, lifting one an inch or so, before swapping their positions as he continues, "or I get recalled, and you get an opponent who attempts to discorporate you on  _ sight _ again."

Arteael is quiet for a few seconds, their lip curling in apparent dissatisfaction. They had been, if nothing else, mostly willing to follow through on this little arrangement not to fuck each other over. It was less paperwork, not being discorporated every  _ blessed _ time they crossed paths, and being able to sometimes invoke this -- the 'don't interfere in each other's work' clause -- is a plus.

A pain in the ass when Arte is feeling shirty and feels like arguing that interfering with Crowley's plots  _ is _ their work, but sometimes useful.

Their grimace tightens a bit before they sigh and down the rest of the coffee. Crowley can tell exactly when the caffeine high hits them, the blunt 'I'm not paid enough for this' look slips a fraction into something  _ almost  _ accommodating. "I'll bite. Who is your unlucky bastard, then?"

"Oh, yeah, telling you exactly who I'm messing with to get you not to interfere in my messing with them is a brilliant plan, definitely doing that."

"Fuck off," Arteael says flatly. "So I can stay away for plausible deniability, you asshole."

Crowley groans out an annoyed sound, fighting the urge to roll his eyes. "Ugh. Fine. I'm trying to seduce the owner of a massage parlour in Soho into lust. I get him to fuck a customer - me - and in theory, it'll prompt him to think about it with many if not all customers who follow. Bim-bam-boom, soul condemned with lust."

"So if it's that simple, what about this human makes you so sure he isn't headed for hell in the first place?" Arteael asks, closing over the newspaper that they'd been perusing.

"He's religious," Crowley says, shrugging his shoulders. "Humans of faith are harder to get started, but count for more in our books for stealing them from the path to heaven."

"And you're certain he's religious because…?"

"His shop is almost entirely Eden themed. He’s either actively religious or well-educated and lapsed." Crowley glanced at the newspaper idly, his lip curling when he saw it was the Celestial Observer. He wondered if he could get away with setting the heavenly  _ tabloid _ on fire, or if Arte would take that as a breach of their truce. Knowing the angel, probably the latter. "Weird part is he has this mural on the wall and it’s…" he trailed off, shaking his head. "It’s  _ spooky _ , it looks just like Eden used to. Almost like the artist was there, or had a Divine Inspiration to match it."

"Hm," Arteael’s lips purse, and they look up to meet Crowley’s gaze, "I haven’t heard anything about any divine inspirations recently. That was usually Raphael’s business, though, not my department."

"What  _ is _ your department?" Crowley asks snidely, "All I ever hear is you saying what  _ isn’t _ your department."

"My business, while I’m down here, is orders from higher-ups and I'm not at liberty to talk about them, of course, but topside I actually work in HR."

"HR?" Crowley repeats dubiously, tilting his head. It’s hard to imagine this blunt-force-trauma of an angel working in Heavenly Resources. Usually, when he thinks of HR workers he thinks of the ones who actually  _ have _ the patience of saints.

"I’m the one who makes problems go _ away _ when they can’t be dealt with otherwise." Arteael asserts, voice flat.

"Ah.  _ That _ kind of HR worker, gotcha."

"In any case, if it’s a divine inspiration then it’s likely either not a sanctioned one,  _ or _ from the very top, but it’s not one I had the chance to hear about."

"What, you get a memo every time someone else is interfering down here or something?"

There was a few seconds of tense silence, as Arte stared him down.

"More or less," the brunet finally murmured, seeming to come to some sort of conclusion and humming thoughtfully, tapping their fingers against the table for a moment and considering how much to tell him. "I’ve reminded Gabriel multiple times that, per policy, while I’m the primary angelic emissary assigned to Earth, I’m to be informed when other angels are Earthside, and what they're doing."

"That’s  _ policy _ ?"

"It’s  _ politics _ ." Arteael shrugs, "Enacted shortly after the sealing of Eden, one of the few unarguable compromises settled upon. It’s why you and I are the primary emissaries and the planet isn’t swarmed by demons and angels at each other’s throats right now. Only one  _ active _ emissary from either side is allowed to be interfering on Earth, until the Apocalypse. Informing me when another angel is enacting any miracles down here is a courtesy of safety, since as the primary angelic emissary, I’d be the most likely target if Hell decides to  _ enforce _ that limit."

Crowley hums noncommittally and decides wisely not to mention the fact that he’s pretty sure Hell has quite a few more demons active than just him. It’s either that or humans are just  _ that good  _ at doing his job for him.

"Don’t you get memos?" Arteael asks suddenly, frowning at him. "As a safety measure?"

"Arte, if I get a memo from Hell, I run the other way." Crowley drawls, but the joke in his voice falls flat. It’s an unfortunate truth that to be ignored is much,  _ much _ safer than to have Hell’s attention  _ at all _ . His forced grin falls a few seconds later, "Heaven could be hunting me down to make snakeskin shoes for the Almighty Herself, and I wouldn’t get a warning from Hell until I was being  _ skinned _ ." He pauses, before adding, "And that would be if I was  _ off _ of the Shit List."

Arteael grimaces, breaking eye contact and looking away.

"That bad, then?" Arteael asks, almost reluctantly, like they still find it a little hard to believe that Hell could really be  _ that _ bad despite the fact that it’s  _ Hell _ .

"I wonder," Crowley replies, his voice holding just a tad bit more venom than he really intended. Arteael is kind enough to flinch at his tone, but not kind enough to apologize. Crowley scowls, turning his own attention away, and after a few seconds, Arteael clears their throat once more.

"So-- er. You said you were… aiming to get  _ off _ of the Shit List?"

"That's the idea," Crowley says, smiling a tight, vicious sort of smile. "So I'd appreciate you, y'know, tossing a little  _ mercy _ my way and letting me get it over with."

"...I suppose it's more... sensible... to turn my eye from one poor soul if it means that you and your terrible work ethic continues to be all I have to deal with." Arteael falters, their eyes downcast toward their hands and a gentle fidget starting in their fingers. After a second or two into uncomfortable silence they glance up at him again, and Crowley lets a little bit of the bitter poison drain from his mood.

Arteael is, at heart, a decent person. They’d managed to retain a perfectly civil attitude with him since the fifteen hundreds. They aren’t a  _ friend _ , but Crowley likes to believe that they are at least not an  _ enemy. _ He can’t be absolutely certain that they won’t pull their daggers on him, but he has at least a fair promise that they would try not to.

They're still fidgeting. Their fingers are twitching and tugging at the loose skin between their thumb and forefingers, and Crowley can almost  _ taste _ the nerves rolling about their scent. There's something bothering them. Something they don't want to admit.

“ _ What _ .”

His voice is free of all inflection, just shading into force, and still makes the Principality visibly flinch as though he had struck with fangs and venom with the intent to discorporate. Arte’s fidgeting grows more prominent.

“...it’s nothing that concerns you.” Arteael insists, managing to press their hands down against the newspaper and force themself to stop. Crowley can taste the lie on their scent. It smells vaguely like sour apples.

“You  _ know _ I don’t believe you for a second.” Crowley scowls, leaning back and sprawling a bit on his stolen chair so that he can fix the Principality with an unblinking stare behind his glasses. Arte’s eyes grow sharper, defensive, and for a second Crowley readies himself for their first all-out brawl in over four centuries, before the fight drains from Arte’s form all at once and they look away again.

“Fine. It’s not something I’m at liberty to  _ tell _ you, though.” They admit, gathering the newspaper and folding it into a roll again. They also gather the empty Starbucks cup and push to their feet. “You have my word that I won’t interfere in your… current endeavors.”

Crowley also pushes to his feet, resisting the urge to dig the tips of his fingers into the table beneath them. Feeling petty, he wiggles a finger at the empty cup in Arte’s hands, and the Principality pauses as it fills itself up again. Without a word of explanation, Crowley turns and shoves his hands in his pockets.

“Guess I’ll remove myself before you decide I’ve overstayed my welcome. Seems my bribery did what I needed it to do. Later, Arte.”

He’s just finishing shoving the chair back under the table when their voice comes from behind him again, quieter this time. “Crowley.”

It’s the first time Crowley has ever known the prick to actually use his correct name. It’s always been ‘snake’. Or on particularly cruel days, ‘Crawly’.

He stills, but doesn’t turn around to face the angel again. His stillness is the only permission that Arteael will get.

There’s a brief hesitation, before Arteael speaks again, soft enough that Crowley almost has to strain to hear them in the first place; “...you would do well to watch your back,” they start, and a chill goes down Crowley’s spine at the edgelessness of the warning. This isn’t a reminder that they can and may eventually turn on him. This is genuine. “No one else is going to do it for you.”

_ I am not the only threat to you, and I will not be dragged down by being your ally. _

This is uncharacteristically sincere for them. He refuses to turn and show that he’s shaken. Instead, he forces a small huff of air out through his nose and curls his lip into the familiar territory of a sneer. “Be careful, Arteael,” he says, returning the courtesy of respecting the other’s name for once. “That almost sounds like you care.”

He strides away from the table, but not fast enough to miss the derisive snort that the angel gives behind him, to hear the dry words: “Perish the thought.”

* * *

> (The Principality Arteael, as previously said, is an angel that works under the Archangel Uriel _. _ They are not what one would call a warrior despite their ranking and their assignment of weaponry. The only reason that Gabriel has kept them as the primary angelic emissary on Earth and doing their work, disregarding that they were the first to even prove they could survive down there, is due to their thorough experience with  _ gathering and acting upon information. _
> 
> The blessings are the necessary part of being a heavenly emissary. Arteael was not a good fit for the world when they were assigned, and has struggled with the assigned blessing work while planetside. But still they remain.
> 
> You may wonder  _ why _ , dear readers, and you would be right in doing so.
> 
> The angel that you knew was perhaps  _ too _ good of a fit for the world,  _ too _ good at hiding in plain sight, and his incompetence in Heaven’s eyes came from being  _ sentimental _ . This is not to say that he was, in fact, incompetent. He was actually quite impressively clever, and perfectly willing to tear things apart if he had to.
> 
> Most of the original assigned angels in _ this _ story were the opposite. They were diligent workers, keeping up the work of the Plan and doing the necessary blessings easily, but they were almost categorically incapable of staying hidden. The irony of it all is that more often than not, the Demon Crowley had nothing at all to do with their inevitable, repeated discorporations.
> 
> Arteael was Gabriel’s greatest concession; Heaven has a task that needs doing, one which no other assigned emissary has managed to do, and one which it is seen as imperative that Hell does  _ not _ learn about.
> 
> But that, dear readers, is why you’re here, and going into any further detail at this point  would be telling.)


End file.
